


high end halls

by sunflowerbright



Series: Hotel California [2]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Schönberg/Boublil, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Alternate Universe - Supernatural, Depression, F/M, Gen, M/M, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-13
Updated: 2013-04-19
Packaged: 2017-12-08 09:00:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/759553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunflowerbright/pseuds/sunflowerbright
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They see each other again, after the barricade falls</p><p>It's another life, and they don't remember at first, but you take what you can get </p><p>or, the one that shows us how it all started (in this life anyway)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Part One

**Author's Note:**

> This is the prequel to 'roses red', but that one should be read first

“Do you like it?” she asked, battering her eyelashes at him just so. The man gave her a wide smile.

“I love it. And it’s the real one?”

“Yes, absolutely, it’s a real Dicksee-painting,” _except for that likeness of Pikachu in the background, but you haven’t noticed that yet. You dolt._

The man turned to her, his eyes gleaming with excitement. “I’ll take it, Madame. Was it nine we said?”

“I do believe we agreed ten, Monsieur,” she replied, lips curving in a smile that would hopefully make his heart beat just a little faster. It looked like it was succeeding.

“Ten, of course,” he said, handing her the amount in cash. “It’s been great doing business with you. I hope we can do so again soon,” he said, shaking her hand.

“Oh, me too,” she said, trying not to make a face at the mere notion. She was out of the door in the next minute, down the street and leaving the man and the fake painting further and further behind. The sun was shining, and she couldn’t help but beam right back at it.

Of course, then Fantine got a phone-call that definitely changed her mood.

 

*

 

Grantaire had known Eponine since they were both young and too damaged to really understand how much they needed someone else to latch onto. It had been just after his parents had died and his aunt had so generously opened her arms to him. One day he had been walking down the street, and a little girl with bright red hair had been sitting on the side-walk, crying her eyes out because she had gotten lost, and Grantaire had ended up walking her home.

There had been a worried older sister at the door, Eponine scolding Azelma for going out so late, but no parents had shown, only raised voices shouting from the living-room revealing that there even existed parents in this sad home.

“Sorry,” Eponine had said to him. “Thanks for bringing her home.”

“Not a problem,” he had said. “No-one should be crying on the side-walk alone.”

As stated above, they had sort of just latched onto each other after that point. Him with no parents and her with parents that a big part of her wished she could get rid of (and an even bigger part of him wished she could get rid of them too, because there were no people in this world as poisonous as the Thénardiers)

Azelma and Gavroche, the runt of the litter as Grantaire loved to call him, had been making jokes about how the older kid had practically adopted them, despite it almost being the other way around. Grantaire didn’t mind. It was one less way to be lonely. One less way for their parents to be the biggest part in shaping their lives.

So when crook one and crook two suddenly up and disappeared, Grantaire was relieved.

For all of five seconds. Then Eponine called.

“Shit,” she’d said, her voice breathless with _fear_ , and while Grantaire had known her to be afraid before, he had never known her to show it like this. It was terrifying. It was terrifying because her parents had been missing for more than a week, and things had been _quiet_ and alright, and they’d come to stay more at Grantaire’s new place, his small, dingy flat that was more home than their house had ever been. So for Eponine to suddenly be so scared, it could only mean one thing.

“Shit,” she repeated. “Shit, shit, shit and fuck. Is Gavroche with you?”

“He’s gotten it into his head to redecorate my kitchen, so yes. What’s happening?”

“ _Shit_.”

“You’ve said that.”

“Grantaire,” Eponine’s voice had gone slightly high-pitched now. “Grantaire, my parents robbed a bank.”

Grantaire’s eyes widened. “What?”

“A bank.”

“A bank?”

“A bank.”

“Fuck.”

“Yes.”

“Did the police get them?”

Eponine’s answer was a groan.

“Oh. Well,” Grantaire wet his lips. “That’s… okay, that’s fucked up. Wait, what’s going to happen to… to you?”

“I don’t know,” Eponine answered, sounding like all of the fight had left her. And all Grantaire wanted to do was reassure her. But he had no idea what to even say.

 

*

 

“Suspension, Javert, means _suspension_.”

Javert tried not to scowl at his boss (that really wasn’t a seemly thing to do), and instead mastered a neutral expression and kept his temper in check.

“I know, sir, but clearly whoever did this job are the same ones who broke into the Louvré last year, and if I could only…”

“You have no evidence of that, Javert,” his boss persisted, using his _‘I’m about to flush myself out through the toilet if you don’t shut up’-_ voice. There was no mistaken the absence of ‘Inspector’ before his surname either. Had Javert been a different man, he would have been tempted to hit his superior with a chair.

Very, very tempted.

He bit his tongue and refrained from pointing out that there was plenty of evidence, that someone was toying with them, that someone wanted something and had plenty of time and means to get it. And there was not one damn thing Javert could do about it, because he had been _suspended until further notice._

And all just for doing his duty. Young people starting brawls in bars, no matter how minor, had to meet justice. He didn’t care that this ‘Bahorel’ person hadn’t actually started it, he’d participated and he’d had the gall to call Javert a ‘dog of the law’, and Javert had been trying to _stop_ the fight, not join in on it, really. But his boss had yelled for a good half hour, before declaring that Javert was suspended, on holiday, so he could catch up with some ‘goddamn sleep’, because he was looking more and more ragged by the second. It had made Javert almost fly into a rage, because _holiday!_ , which hadn’t exactly helped the situation much. But it wasn’t as if he could help it. The dreams – the nightmares, really – had started again and he still wasn’t getting peaceful sleep.

“Is there anything else Javert? You still have to turn in your gun.”

“It’s at home,” Javert said, actually thankful that he had left it at home, and so didn’t have to hand it in now. Was he supposed to trawl the streets of Paris _unarmed_? Was his boss insane?

“Right. You should be going now,” his boss said, clearly too tired to make more of a fuss about weapons and whatnot. “Have a nice _holiday_.”

Javert gritted his teeth and tried not to weep at the mention of that word. He stalked out of the office, not even bothering to bid anyone a good day (it was not a good day!), he left the police-station.

 

*

 

Eponine could stay with him. She could move in, and maybe they’d let Azelma move in too, she was a teenager now, and Gavroche… Gavroche would probably be forced into the blasted system, but he would be allowed to come visit, and they’d see him, and when he was old enough, he could move in with them as well, and Grantaire didn’t care that he lived in a one-bedroom flat, they’d all had little space growing up and they could deal with little space now. They were going to get through this. Things were going to be alright.

Not that that was going to stop him from going down to drink his brains out, because _fuck._

Of all times. Couldn’t they have waited until all of their kids were at least nearing legal age, before pulling a stunt like this? _Robbing a bank._ For all of their idiocy, Grantaire would have never guessed that it extended as far as this. They must have been really desperate.

He was on his fifth beer – hardly getting a buzz – when someone tapped him on the shoulder, quite hard, actually, how rude, and he turned around only to stare straight into a broad chest.

“Um,”

 _“You!”_ the man before him hissed. He was tall, and broad and looked like someone had just kicked his puppy and he’d sucked on a lemon at the same time.

“Um?”

“It’s…” he was _pale_ , Grantaire suddenly noticed, the man was looking at him as if he had seen a ghost. It was discontenting, because Grantaire had never met the man before.

_No wait._

“You’re that officer, aren’t you?” he blurted out, and _dammit_. “I saw you on the news, I mean,” _I saw you sniffing around the neighbourhood that time papa Thénardier was selling marijuana._ “Inspector… what is it?”

“Javert.”

“Javert, that’s it,” his throat suddenly felt dry. What was this man doing here and why was he looking at Grantaire like that. “Um, sir, your police-inspectorness-sir, are you quite alright?”

Without another word, the man turned around and walked away, looking like he might throw up or pass out any minute. Grantaire stared after him for what felt like minutes, even as the door closed and he went out of sight.

“I need another drink,” he mumbled to himself, startling as someone unfamiliar yet again touched his shoulder.

“I’m broke, arm-wrestle me for another beer?” Okay, definitely not some police-inspector this time. The man Grantaire was staring at was as tall as Javert, if not taller, brown-skinned with thick, dark hair and deep, brown eyes. He was muscled and had a bruise on his temple and an old cut on his lip. He grinned at Grantaire’s befuddled expression.

“I’m Bahorel,” he said. “And anyone that can drive away Javert deserves the chance to arm-wrestle me.”

Well, okay then.

 

*

 

Growing up is never easy, but growing up with criminals for parents were even worse.

Grantaire didn’t quite know how he got so mixed up in the Thénadier’s lives, but by the time his aunt went to prison and the choice was between the foster-system and the foster-system just letting him stay with this insane family, the choice was an easy one.

And it wasn’t always bad. There were moments, like when Monsieur Thénardier taught him how to pick locks, or when Montparnasse had declared both Grantaire and Eponine his eternal love and had been standing underneath their window in the middle of the night serenading them, and Madame Thénardier had thrown a flower-pot at him.

There had been helping Gavroche with his homework when the kid would actually sit still enough to listen, and watching Azelma practicing her dancing and sneaking up to the roof with Eponine and sharing cigarettes nicked from her father. There’d been curling up against each other in too-small beds, avoiding bruises and cuts, but still holding tightly, and the wonderful moment when his birthday came around and he could move out, hard work making sure he had enough to actually do so.

But still, Grantaire would not have counted himself so lucky as to completely escape all this mess.

And he was going to be damned if he let Eponine deal with it all on her own.

Turns out he didn’t even have to.

“He’s in my class,”

“Who is?” Grantaire asked, looking up from his morning-coffee.

“Marius,” Eponine sighed. She’d moved the last of her things into the flat yesterday, making them dinner and excitedly telling him all she knew about the group he had encountered a couple of days before, _les Amis,_ or whatever the hell they were calling themselves. The doctor-one had explained something about the alphabet and right of the people, and Grantaire had honestly stopped listening, especially when the other man went off on a tangent and started rambling about syphilis instead. Interesting as that was, Grantaire had found the beer Bahorel now owed him much more fascinating.

“They’re an activist-group, they’re starting uni in a month, just like me. Most of them have known each other since forever, I think.”

“How do you know Marius is in your class, then?”

“Something called the internet and lesson-plans, Grantaire.”

“Well, I wouldn’t know anything about that,” he threw back, irritably pouring whiskey into his mug. “I’m working three jobs instead of going to university, remember?”

“You’re not going to university because you don’t want to go to university,” Eponine countered, though he recognized the almost-question in her tone. _Are you doing this for me. You have to stop that._

“I’d do horribly in university,” he mumbled, trying to reassure her. “I’d end up setting my teacher on fire, or another student on fire, or more likely myself on fire.”

She snorted. “And we wouldn’t want that.”

“No, it would be detrimental to staying alive, I think.”

“You still haven’t met Enjolras, have you?”

“I still haven’t met who?”

“Enjolras. Trust me, you’d remember if you had met him. He’s their leader.”

“I thought that doctor-one was their leader. Not the one that almost fainted when I explained what the five-second rule was, but the other one, the blonde, kinda cute one?”

Eponine actually laughed at that. “You thought Combeferre was cute?”

Grantaire shrugged. “He was.”

“I suppose he is,” Eponine mumbled. Then she threw him a _look_. “But wait until you meet Enjolras.”

Grantaire made an irritated noise into his coffee.

And then of course, later that day, he meets Enjolras.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- Come say hi on my tumblr, where I reblog a lot of shit and moan about writing: http://brightasasunflower.tumblr.com/
> 
> \- ETA: story formerly titled 'I aim to misbehave'. I might be writing a short firefly!au, so I changed it to avoid confusion (mainly confusing myself though)


	2. Part Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Courfeyrac made an ‘aaah’ sound that Grantaire almost missed, because he was busy mouthing ‘bisexual glory’ at Eponine in wordless wonder.

Grantaire wanted to paint Enjolras. He wanted the man to sit still so he could catch all the edges and contours and lines of his face, and then he wanted him to start talking and moving again – talking just like he was right now, animated and full of light, blazing like the sun, so he could paint him like that as well, bright colours and moving lights.

The man was breath-taking. There were no other words for it. He was like an angel come down from Heaven, landing in their mists like a burning star. None could look at him and not pray that they never had to look away again.

Or at least Grantaire couldn’t.

Grantaire, as it turned out, also couldn’t keep his mouth shut.

“That’s never going to work,” he said, as the glorious Unearthly being before him stopped his ranting to take a breath. Immediately, grey eyes snapped to him, so intense Grantaire could actually feel them burn holes through his skull.

He wondered if Enjolras could read his thoughts and see his soul with that gaze, with those eyes, and he had to fight a blush from rising. Jesus Christ, he hadn’t blushed since he was nine years old.

 _Please,_ he thought as Enjolras continued to glare at him, clearly not used to being told he was wrong. _Please, let me paint you._

“You don’t believe people won’t get tired of it, of this injustice?” Enjolras finally said. Grantaire wondered how much the other man’s brain had malfunctioned in the face of Grantaire’s scepticism, and suddenly all of his awkwardness about those eyes fell away.

Or, at least, some of it.

“Sure, people get tired of all this shit,” Grantaire said, taking a swig of the beer before him. “They get tired and then they rally, and then nothing happens for a while, and then they get tired of nothing happening, so they go home. People are little shits who change their minds, and it’s going to take more than a few protestors – a few _school-boys -_ to change things.”

“You’re wrong,” Enjolras countered immediately, and wow, had he been sitting at home practicing that response? Really. “People won’t let it stand. When united, we won’t fail.”

Grantaire snorted. Everyone else around them had gone eerily quiet, and he was very much aware of them staring at him. “You just keep telling yourself that.”

He startled, almost dropping his drink when Enjolras suddenly slammed his hands onto the top of the table. Several of the others jumped in surprise as well, shooting their leader vary looks.

“So I suppose you’d proclaim yourself a bystander then?” the golden man – boy, actually – almost yelled at him, eyes burning. “Let me guess, you’ve been happy to stand on the side, all of your life, and watch other people being tortured by the society they grew up in, being manipulated and lied to, and all you did was sit in your corner and laugh, because they should have known better than to ask for help?”

Grantaire felt like he couldn’t breathe: everything around him turned red, and his hands felt strangely warm after gripping the cold bottle, like he’d been pressing them together, and his heart was hammering, a thousand miles per second.

It lasted a second. Then he laughed.

“Yes, sure,” he said, keeping a jovial tone, _jovial, don’t let her see you are as frightened as she is, don’t let him see you shake, don’t let her father get to her, get in-between them, do it now_. “I’m a right devil. I kick nuns and puppies. I sometimes go visit orphanages just to tell children there is no Santa Claus. I’m a horrid person.”

“That must keep you awake at night,” Eponine said, smirking slightly, to the great confusion of the others.

“Nah, usually it’s just coffee,” he said, shooting her a grateful look for remembering, for swooping in like this when she had been busy flirting with that freckled bean-pole that Marius turned out to be (though he had been the only other one to make Enjolras look like he wanted to beat them all to death with a shovel, so he supposed there should be a pact between him and Pontmercy now, a secret brotherhood, or something like that).

“We should probably leave,” she said then, standing up and reaching for her coat, completely ignoring Marius quiet protests and Combeferre’s concerned look. “We have a tight schedule, don’t we Grantaire?”

“Ah yes, a death ray to build, kids to starve, you know how it is,” he was out of his own chair like a shot, ready to leave, because the world had gone back to its normal colour _(why had everything been red?)_ but he still felt faint, and if Enjolras was going to keep looking at him like he was the scum of the Earth, Grantaire was going to drop dead right there on the floor of the bar, from the sheer force of his self-hatred.

Said man – _boy, he’s just a boy, he’s younger than you even, and you’re too young already –_ looked between them, his expression going a bit back to normal, which was probably Righteous Fury level 1, as opposed to the level 40 that Grantaire had just experienced.

“You live together?” Ah. Of course. They didn’t even know that he knew Eponine: Bahorel had invited him to sit with them like he was an old comrade in war, and Eponine probably hadn’t mentioned her living-conditions and the why’s and how’s of having parents that robbed banks, after only meeting with the others a few times. It was too private, and too messy.

“We’re roommates,” Eponine said. “C’mon, R, let’s go.”

“You don’t have to, we can…” the one named Courfeyrac started to say, but Eponine sent him her best shark-smile and he abruptly shut up – her smile had that effect. Courfeyrac was looking both scared and impressed. 

“It’s fine, I’ll see you all later,” at this point she was gripping the back of Grantaire’s jacket, practically hauling him after her.

He was grateful. As soon as the cool air outside hit him, he toppled forwards, gasping for breath like a dying man. Why couldn’t he breathe? Why had the world started flashing red again?

 “Grantaire?” Eponine’s voice was frantic, and he quickly righted himself, not wanting to worry her anymore. She should never have to worry about him, even though he knew she did so anyway, all the time.

“I’m alright,” he said. “I’m fine. That was just…”

“He’s an ass,” she hissed, not letting go of Grantaire’s arm where she’d latched on. “He talks so big, and he’s just…”

“It’s okay, I was being an ass as well,” Grantaire interrupted. “Let’s just go home,” he moved to leave, but she was still hanging onto him, and _she_ wasn’t moving anywhere.

“R?” she said, her voice quiet, and shit, she never called him R, not since they were little and had a secret hand-shake and code-words for angry parents and police being spotted nearby, and _shit._

“It’s nothing,” he said to her and Eponine _glared_ , and Eponine glaring was possibly the scariest thing in the world. But his world was still tinted red, and Grantaire kept his mouth shut.

 

*

 

Grantaire went to Les Amis’ next meeting, because Eponine had relayed messages from Combeferre, Bahorel, Joly and someone named Jehan (Grantaire thought it might the quiet one in the horrible sweater, that had smiled so shyly and looked like he’d been punched in the face when Grantaire and Enjolras had started arguing), all apologizing for what had happened, all coming up with reasons why he should come again next time.

So he did just that.

(he doesn’t want to admit to himself, or anyone else, that he would have come anyway. He wouldn’t have been able to stay away, knowing who was down there.

He wouldn’t have.)

He was greeted right at he stepped in through the door at the small café they were currently occupying, by the one the maybe-your-name-is-Jehan wearing a sweater with _unicorns_ , but alright, the other boy was practically _beaming_ at him, and it was weird to have someone be that happy to see him, especially someone whose name he hardly even remembered.  

Eponine was happy he was there, he knew that. They were happy for each other just in general. Azelma was thankful, though she was still a brat that would yell and shout as soon as she didn’t get her way (none of that stopped her from sneaking into the living-room and curling up next to him on their big, old, ratty couch as he flips through channels. It’s a quiet agreement based on comfort). Gavroche… well, who knew what that kid was thinking at the best of times. Grantaire had always thought the boy needed a role model that wasn’t either his sorry excuse for a father, or his sorry excuse for a semi-adoptive, alcoholic brother. 

But that kind of happiness wasn’t the same as Jehan dragging him towards the table, ranting on about something-or-other they were going to talk about, and it wasn’t until he had been firmly planted in a chair and a beer’s been put down in front of him, that Grantaire realized they were all discussing domestic violence and the laws surrounding it, and _fuck,_ he was going to need to finish this beer right now, in one gulp, let’s ignore that Joly is frowning at him like that.

He got a smile from most of the people around him, and he blinked in surprise when he saw Gavroche sitting on his left side, partly trying to hide behind Courfeyrac who ended up shttoing Grantaire an apologetic smile.

“He really wanted to come,” he said, and Grantaire wanted to strangle someone, because _rallies_ and demonstrations turning violent in general, and none of it were any place for a child.

(though to be honest, if there ever was a child it were the places for, then that child would be Gavroche)

Enjolras didn’t look at him as he spoke, but Grantaire was luckily content sitting and staring at him, words drowning in and out as if he was seeing everything through a fog, Enjolras being the only light that shines through.

Watching Enjolras talking was like watching a force of nature at work. He was magnetic, and even Grantaire felt himself pulled under the man’s spell, drawn in and unwilling to leave again. He spoke with arrogance, but also like he _knew_ , and like he believed every word he said, like all of it was important, none of it said for appearance or to please the masses. It wasn’t some kid doing good to make himself feel better. He was like a marble statue come to life, with all the grace of man and possessing none of the doubt that so easily took hold of the rest of the human race. When Enjolras spoke, Grantaire believed. Even if just for a second.

He was pulled out from his mesmerizing daze when Enjolras finished speaking, and Grantaire instead found himself roped into another arm-wrestling competition with Bahorel, a Polish kid named Feuilly cheering them both on as he watched.

“I let you win this one,” Grantaire proclaimed afterwards, rubbing his arm. “So you wouldn’t feel too bad after last time.”

Bahorel only laughed, and Grantaire felt something loosen in his chest. He caught Eponine’s gaze (she was sitting with Marius again, the slim boy rambling on and on about something, and Grantaire wondered if he ever let Eponine do some of the talking between them) and smiled slightly. He got a relieved look in return, and a vague hand-gesture asking whether they should be going home or if they could stay a little while longer. Grantaire shrugged, oddly content with staying.

(though they probably should get home. Last meeting, when he’d stumbled in through the door with Eponine, still trying to catch his breath properly, Azelma had been convinced that a murderer had run loose inside the building.

_“Why the hell did you take your sister’s pet-hamster into the bedroom with you?”_

_“I thought I was in the first five minutes of a horror-movie! First rule of surviving a horror-movie is that you don’t split up into groups!”_

_“… You do know it’s a hamster, right?”_

But for now, Grantaire wanted to stay here. Just for now.)

“So, are you and her doing it?” Courfeyrac sat down next to Grantaire, who almost choked on his whiskey.

“Excuse me?”

“You and Eponine. I mean, you’re living together. Is she your girlfriend?”

Grantaire laughed. “Oh, she wishes.”

“Very much so,” Eponine said, appearing suddenly as if the mention of her name had magically summoned her to their side. Like Beetlejuice, or Satan. “I just couldn’t resist his manly charms. I had to have him. You shouldn’t laugh, ‘Taire, it is very much the truth. You’re impossible to resist.”

“Especially when I’m dying your eyebrows blue while you’re sleeping.”

“Oh, yes, nothing screams ‘take me now’ like a multi-coloured face. Unfortunately for me and the general female populace, Grantaire, in all his bisexual glory, usually prefers boys.”

Courfeyrac made an ‘aaah’ sound that Grantaire almost missed, because he was busy mouthing _‘bisexual glory’_ at Eponine in wordless wonder.

They were all distracted when a young woman with a long braid sashayed over, kissing Joly on the cheek and scooting in-between him and Grantaire, introducing herself as Musichetta ( _‘but call me ‘Chetta’_ ,) and asking him if he had heard about the latest news-scandal, a fake Frank Dicksee painting being sold to some eccentric art-lover, and did Grantaire like _Funeral of a Viking_ better than his _La Belle Dame Sans Merci,_ and suddenly half of the evening had slipped away with him and her and Feuilly, discussing art and Polish drinking songs.

Grantaire didn’t notice the intense eyes trained at the back of his head during that. But he did see it when, upon finally leaving, him and Eponine trying to keep each other upright because they _may_ have drunk a bit too much (okay, Grantaire _knows_ that he’s drunk a bit too much), Enjolras caught his gaze and, after a heartbeat that felt like it lasted half a century, nodded slightly at him, without saying a word.

It was not an apology, not from either of them, but it was the closest to acceptance Grantaire had ever gotten from someone convinced he killed bunnies in his spare time. So he’d take it.

_(he draws a rough sketch of a golden boy when he wakes the next day, and when Eponine asks, he says it’s a depiction of Apollo. He isn’t lying.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- Next chapter will be 'roses red' from Grantaire's POV, and should be up sometime this weekend


	3. Part Three

Grantaire’s parents had died when he was hardly ten years old. His aunt, his mother’s sister, had taken care of him for less than a year, until it all became too much – he still wasn’t sure what exactly it was that had become too much for her. If it was the loss of her sister, her own depression or having to take care of a little, damaged boy all of the sudden. Or perhaps all of it at once.

But things had come to a head, and he had found himself without parents, without an aunt, but with a red-haired tiny slip of a girl crying on the side-walk. And then there had been the Thénardiers, and now…

Now there were _Les Amis_ , and really, Grantaire wanted to believe that this was an improvement, wanted to believe that things were looking up, because no matter how much he drank or how many times he screwed up _(“Grantaire, I asked you to go get the folders down at the library, why are they still there?” “Grantaire, could you paint a banner for us?” “I could paint you naked if you’d like,” “I think I’d like you to shut up now.”),_ they still seemed somehow willing to let him hang around. Perhaps it was because of Eponine, whose interest may have started with Marius, but who ended up throwing herself into the work as wholeheartedly dedicated as any of the others. She wouldn’t allow the others to treat him like dirt. Perhaps it was because Combeferre, Jehan and Joly, in their compassionate ways, insisted. Perhaps it was because Bahorel had finally found someone he could easily persuade into starting fights with. Perhaps it was Bossuet, who seemed almost ridiculously pleased to have met someone who was almost as unfortunate in his every-day manner as he was (they’d managed to accidentally set Courfeyrac and Enjolras’ flat on fire once, when left unattended). Or perhaps it was Musichetta and Feuilly, both interested in art enough to talk with him about it until the long hours of the night, all three exhausted from work but not willing to quite stop yet.

Or maybe Marius had a secret crush on him. One never knew. But Grantaire wasn’t told to leave them alone, not even when he yet again seemed to completely fail at some small task, or turn Enjolras’ face so red with rage that Joly started fretting about their fearless leader’s blood-pressure.

Because, of course, there was Enjolras. The reason Grantaire found himself sitting at the café or at the bar, looking until his eyes hurt, and drinking until he somehow forgets that he is in love with an actual God in human form, who would never degrade himself to love any normal human being, let alone someone as wretched as Grantaire.

And that, all of that, was why it came as a bit of a surprise, when Enjolras sends him a text, asking him to please come to his flat, because they need to talk.

Grantaire was tempted to just text back _no_ , or call Enjolras and say that he can tell him over the phone, and the desire to do so was there because he was afraid of what would happen if he actually went over there now, to the man’s flat, seeing him face-to-face in a setting more unfamiliar than the café or the bar and their corners to hide in. Clearly Enjolras wanted something from him, and the likelihood that it was another favour, given his current track-record, was slim to none. So it had to be a scolding, though Grantaire couldn’t for the love of him remember what he’d done in the last few days to demand their glorious leader’s sole attention. Maybe he was worried the death-ray was almost finished.

He ended up going over there anyway, because _Enjolras asked_ , and Grantaire knows that he is pathetic enough that he would do anything Enjolras asked, would throw himself into the Seine or black the man’s boots or… or even die for him, he thinks. Anything that wasn’t too much responsibility, of course, because he had clearly shown how well he handled that.

Enjolras looked, of all things, _nervous_ , when Grantaire got over there (ten minutes late, but he had needed to down a glass of whiskey for courage before leaving). Courfeyrac wasn’t there, and neither was Combeferre or any of the others. Just them. Well shit.

“Grantaire,” Enjolras said, motioning for him to take a seat, and really, it was like being back at school again, getting a lecture from a teacher.

At least, Grantaire was fairly certain a lecture was what was waiting in the wings. Though that would not explain why Enjolras looked like a five-year old had just asked him where babies came from (Grantaire almost laughed out loud at the thought, but nervousness quickly came knocking on his door again, forcing the smile away).

“It has… well…” Enjolras sat down facing him, a small table between them as if acting like a shield. “Something… Combeferre… no, sorry, uh…”

“Are you okay?”

“Yes!” Enjolras said, way too quickly. “I’m fine, it’s just…” he stopped himself yet again and took a deep breath. “It has recently come to my attention,” he started. “That you have certain… I mean that you…”

Grantaire felt his stomach fill with lead, a heavy weigh that was pulling him _down, down, down._

“That you have certain romantic feelings towards me.”

_And down and down and down._

Grantaire’s head started pounding, and he found himself completely speechless. He was a rabbit caught in a trap, spotlight on him, please dance now, sing and do your thing.

He was a decent enough dancer, but he wasn’t good at… he wasn’t good at this.

And then Enjolras’ words really hit him.

“What do you mean ‘it has come to your attention’?” he snapped, the question leaving his mouth before he could stop it, and shit, words really needed to stop doing that to him.

Enjolras sighed. “Please do not get mad at him, but Combeferre accidentally let it slip after the meeting. Anyway, that does not matter,” he cleared his throat as if preparing for a speech, and _fuck_ , Grantaire was going to get a speech about this, and that was the _last thing he wanted on this Earth._

And his mind was still reeling, because _what the hell?_

“I think it would be within the interest of both of us if I made it clear that… well, that nothing is going to happen,” Enjolras said the last bit hurriedly, probably wanting this to get over with _almost_ as much as Grantaire. “And that while your feelings are very much appreciated, and of course very flattering, I would not let it compromise our friendship.”

Grantaire felt something within him snap.

“You mean to say that you were _unaware?”_

Enjolras frowned. “Of your feelings?”

“No, of Marius’ fondness for tap-dancing – _yes my feelings_.”

“Grantaire, please keep your voice down. I’m trying to be civil here.”

Grantaire wanted to scream.

“Well, how fucking noble of you.”

“Grantaire…”

“I’ve been in love with you for three years, and you didn’t know? You do realize you were the only one who didn’t know, right? Have you gotten your eyesight checked lately, because you should!”

Enjolras eyes flashed as he stood up from his chair. “No, I didn’t know, because you never said anything!”

“That didn’t stop the others from _using their brains_.”

“See,” Enjolras said, and fuck, Grantaire knew that tone of voice, knew it like the back of his hand, because it was all too commonly used when Enjolras was talking to him. “ _This_ ,” the other man hissed. “This is exactly why the feelings are not returned. How can you be so hateful? I am trying to salvage this situation, and you insist on fighting me every step of the way.”

“Oh, it’s my favourite hobby.”

“You’re incorrigible,” Enjolras shouted. “You’d rather wallow in your own self-pity than face the world around you, and that is why I can never imagine anyone ever having the slightest inkling of love for you!”

The world shifted and turned grey this time, dull colours and dull sounds. Grantaire stood up.

“Trust me, Apollo,” he said. “I already know that.”

The door clicked shut behind him.

 

*

 

Grantaire’s aunt had been newly released from prison, and despite the stupidity of it ( _you were the one who didn’t want a restraining order, remember that_ ) he goes to visit her. She had been placed in an open home instead, which Grantaire supposed was just a nice way of putting ‘mental ward where anyone can walk in’.

Courage failed him once he arrived at the gates, however, and he ended up standing in front of them, staring like an idiot. He found that he couldn’t move – couldn’t go forwards through those gates, and couldn’t go back to his flat where surely Enjolras would be waiting.

“Are you going in?” a voice like a thousand melodies (no really, that was the only way to describe it, it was _music_ ) came from behind him, and Grantaire spun around in wonder only to be met with yet again _someone not of this world._

“Uh,” he said and the girl behind him, about Eponine’s age, gave him an almost shy half-smile.

“Is there someone you need to see?”

“No,” Grantaire said, glancing behind him. “Well, yes. I mean, I don’t need to. I don’t have to. Only…”

“I’m Cosette,” she said, interrupting him just at the crucial moment when he was about to have a breakdown, and oh, Grantaire could kiss her for that. He took the offered hand, surprised at how strong her grip was as she shook his.

“Grantaire.”

“Nice to meet you,” she said, cocking her head to the side. “Is there anything I can help you with?”

“Can I paint you?” Jesus Christ! He really needed a filter, or just to be gagged really. “That was creepy, wasn’t it? I’m standing here, lurking outside… is it your work-place? You’re wearing a name-badge, this is probably your work-place, and I’m really not a stalker, I promise, I’m here to visit my aunt, and I paint, and you’re… you probably own a mirror, so I’m not going to finish that sentence, and I’m really sorry, I’m just going to leave now.”

He moved to walk, no _run_ , past her, but she grabbed his arms, her eyes still wide in surprise, but she was smiling at him and not calling the cops quite yet.

“Here,” she said, producing a thick black marker from her pocket. “Give me your number, and I’ll call you and you can show me your paintings, and prove that you’re not a stalker, and then we’ll see… okay?”

Grantaire blinked. “Are you asking me on a date?”

“Not really,” she laughed, and shit, her laugh was almost as beautiful as her face. “Do you want me to?”

“Not really.”

“But you still want to paint me?”

“Very much.”

“Then I’ll call,” she wrote the numbers he rattled off on her hand, and put the marker back in her pocket, taking a step back. “Now I have to get to work. Do you want to come inside? It was your aunt, wasn’t it?”

“Yes,” Grantaire said, feeling the lightness the last few seconds had created fade away again. “And I’m… I shouldn’t. I’ll just be going. I’ll… I’ll see you?”

“Probably.”

“Good.”

 

*

 

Grantaire had managed to get his third job because he and the owner, Henri, were old drinking buddies, and because Grantaire knew his way around a kitchen, and when you’re trying to start up a restaurant, you want someone there who knows his way around a kitchen.

He’d only been there a few months, which was perfect, because the others had long ago stopped keeping track of all the different and changing jobs he had _(needed to have),_ and they wouldn’t know to look for him here.

Grantaire did not want anyone to look for him – he shot off a text to Eponine saying he wouldn’t be home for a while, that she shouldn’t worry and should just stay in the flat, and only contact him in case of emergencies.

_And please,_ he thought, staring down at a missed call from Jehan. _Please don’t tell the others were I am._

Would it be pity in their eyes, when he saw them again? Would they whisper and wonder at his own delusions, thinking that he’d had a chance with Enjolras (only that was a lie – he knew he’d never had a chance). He knew that he had run now, because he was afraid of eviction from the group, afraid because he was sure there was a breaking point, even for as kind and good people as his friends, and he was so good at hitting people’s breaking points until it shattered into tiny little pieces.

Enjolras would surely not want him anywhere near him after this, _that_ had been made quite clear. No, no he couldn’t go back. He would, eventually, because Eponine was waiting for him, and she couldn’t get along with Azelma long enough to prevent the girl from doing anything stupid (like running off with a crook like the kinds of Montparnasse, or god forbid Montparnasse himself), and Gavroche would start wondering too, would start looking, and if anyone could probably find him no matter where in Paris he hid, it was Gavroche.

But right now, he couldn’t go back to them, he just couldn’t.

He was dead-drunk by the time Henri came back and quietly asked if he wanted to help him deliver some things at the other end of town. It was going to take a few days, though, he wasn’t sure how long they were going to be gone and…

Grantaire agreed before the man had even finished his sentence.

 

**_From: Courfeyrac, 11:59_ **

_Where are u? meeting’s started_

**_From: Joly, 12:30_ **

_Are you ill?_

**_From: Joly, 12:45_ **

_Is it very bad? Do you need anything???_

**_From: Combeferre, 12:47_ **

_Is this because of Enjolras?_

**_From: Courfeyrac, 12:48_ **

_Are you dead? If you are, I am going to be v. mad, u owe me ten quid_

**_From: Combeferre, 13:13_ **

_I am so, so sorry_

**_From: Jehan, 13:30_ **

_Hope you’re okay <3_

**_From: Jehan, 15:50_ **

_Stopped by yr flat but Ep said you weren’t home. Miss u, come back soon_

_*_

Cosette called him, while he was still at the other end of town unfortunately, but he had a few photos of his old paintings on his phone, that she persuaded him to send to her.

It had been Eponine that had taken them, saying that he was much too prone to throw things out or set them on fire if he was in a bad mood, _like that lovely painting of that Greek god, I can’t believe you destroyed it!,_ and someone needed to immortalize them through the wonders of modern technology and camera-phones.

He got a phone-call minutes later, Cosette’s voice breathless in his ear.

“Hell _yes_ , you can paint me,” she said. “Just not nude. I mean, not nude yet. I like to know people better before I strip in front of them. Like, know their real names and shit. Also, I am going to delete my call-history in fear that my dad finds this. If I don’t show up tomorrow it’s because he has over-heard what I just said and locked me in a tower.”

Grantaire tried, and failed, to suppress his surprised laughter. “So we’re meeting tomorrow? I did mention I was out of town, right? Or, you know, right at the edge of town, rather.”

“You did, but I have some errands to run anyway, I’ll get to you.”

“Oh. Well. That’s… we could meet at… around… um… noon, then? I’ll text you the address. Also,” he said. “My name’s Raphael.”

“ _Like the angel_ ,” Cosette actually purred into his ear. Fuck. If Grantaire’s heart didn’t already belong so wholeheartedly to someone else, he would consider himself in serious danger here. “My real name’s Euphrasie. And if you ever call me that I will _end you_.”

“Such violence for one so young and pretty,” he scolded, still grinning like a loon. He was hallucinating all of this, surely. He couldn’t have met her now, not when he was lost like he hadn’t been lost since he was ten _(a little girl crying on the sidewalk),_ good things like that just didn’t happen, not to him. But Cosette’s cheerful _‘see you soon!’_ on the other line was real. Very real.

**_From: Eponine, 00:23_ **

_Fuck u, u giant asshole, if yr lying dead in a ditch somewhere I will end you_

**_From: Grantaire, 01:14_ **

_You remind me of someone_

**_From: Eponine, 01:16_ **

_Someone like a certain childhood-friend? I think Enj almost had an aneurysm last night when he said that more and more people were standing up for LGBT+, and no-one disagreed with him_

**_From: Grantaire, 01:20_ **

_It must have been a lovely experience_

**_From: Eponine, 01:21_ **

_He looked scared_

**_From: Eponine, 01:30_ **

_Combeferre really blames himself and Joly thinks ur dead (Courf too). Enj’s head might snap off soon, he keeps looking whenever the door goes open at meetings, he looks like a kicked puppy when it isn’t you_

**_From: Eponine, 01:32_ **

_He actually kinda looks like you do when you stare at him_

**_From: Eponine, 01:34_ **

_Are you mad at me now? Suck it up_

**_From: Eponine, 02:00_ **

_I really, really miss you_

**_To: Joly, 14:15_ **

_Am not dead, will get back sometime soon. Working. See you all_

-          _R_

“I like this one,” Cosette said, picking up one of the sketches he had done. Grantaire had been drawing ever since her phone-call, rough sketches of what he remembered, sunlight falling into golden hair, soft full lips and a slender neck. “It makes me look almost regal.”

“Ha,” he said, picking at one of his pencils. “If I had proper art-supplies I could do a lot better, I think. But we could do that, I mean, draw you as a Queen or something.” Oh, Enjolras would love that.

Grantaire needed to stop thinking of Enjolras every other minute.

“We could,” she said, smiling. “Oh, I could be one of those ladies in a gown from an Austen-novel or something.”

“Jane Austen, really?”

“Elizabeth Bennet was always my favourite,” Cosette said, her tone challenging him to make fun of her. Grantaire ducked his head, smiling.

“She is a feisty one.”

“You’re mocking me,”

“Oh, I would never.”

“Grantaire,” Cosette had stopped smiling now, stepping a little closer. “If you… if there’s something you need to talk about… Talking to a stranger can help a lot. I’m not telling you to trust me, because you don’t know me at all, so you shouldn’t. But…”

“But?” Grantaire asked, wanting to sound defensive, but it came out almost broken instead.

“You have very sad eyes, did you know that? At first I thought you were just disappointed, and disinterested or something, but then I realized that wasn’t it at all. You just look really sad. Even now.”

He wanted to duck under the table and hide, but he forced himself to look up and meet her eyes. She really was beautiful, he thought, and she had a kindness around her, the same one Eponine would swear up and down she lacked, putting on a tough front, because the world was tough and hard, and people who knew you were kind pounced on you like wolves.

Cosette looked like that. Like she knew the beasts were near, but she had learned how to fight them off now.

 Grantaire suddenly, desperately wanted her to teach him that.

“That was some deep, philosophical shit,” he said, and _shitshit_ , what had he told himself about that filter? But Cosette didn’t get offended, as should have been her due, merely laughed as if she had looked behind the words and actually understood what he meant.

“Sure, I’m a very deep person,” she said. “Now, should we start on the whole painting-thing?”

 

*

 

He ended up telling her about Eponine and Azelma and Gavroche, about weird police-officers and meeting the best friends he’s ever had because someone wanted to arm-wrestle him. And he told her about Enjolras.

And he painted, for the first time in a long while, something that he actually didn’t want to destroy on sight as soon as he had finished it. Because the look on Cosette’s face when he was finished reminded him of whatever reason he had once had to start painting altogether.

He doesn’t hear from her in the last few days before heading home, but that’s fine, they’d agreed to meet up once he was back in town. He was still sleeping like hell, his bouts of insomnia being interrupted by Eponine’s texts at every turn, and she doesn’t cease until he messages her that he will be back in two days.

Normally there would be a retort, her saying _‘fucking finally’_ or saying that the flat needed cleaning, there were dishes to be washed, anything.

There’s nothing but silence. From all of them, even Jehan, who had been pestering him with updates on what had been going on (Grantaire called it ‘pestering’, but he was grateful and kept all of the texts, all of the little signs that someone as sweet as Jehan cared for someone as broken as him.)

He did finally get home, bone-deep tired from lack of sleep and forcing himself to walk every step of the way, because there had been no booze in the flat _(the abandoned flat, where was everyone?),_ so he dragged himself down to the bar where the rest are, and where there at least would be alcohol, which he could inhale as quickly as possible so he could actually look any of them in the eye.

As he stepped into the bar however, he was a bit shocked to find everyone gathered there, looking at him as if someone had just died.

“Hola,” he said, trying to ease whatever tension was filling the room like a whole entity of its own. Combeferre stood up to go to him, and Grantaire kept himself from cringing, knowing that another apology was coming now, because Combeferre would want to know that he was alright and…

“How much do you remember?”

_What?_

*

 

“Is that all of them?” Fantine asked, staring into her coffee almost glumly.

“Yes, that’s all of them.”

“And there weren’t any lasting side-effects? None of them have… they’ll be fine?”

“Yes,” the elderly man before her smiled kindly. “They’ll have headaches and probably panic a lot, but ultimately they’ll be fine. They have each other to deal with it.”

She sighed, staring out of the window now. “But not Grantaire.”

“No, not Grantaire.”

“And my daughter?”

“Fantine, your daughter is fine.”

“But when can I see her?”

“Soon,” the man reached over and gently placed his hand over hers where it was resting on the table. “Soon, I promise. You didn’t die in this life. She’ll be looking for you.”

Fantine sighed. “I hope so too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- Cosette/Grantaire friendship is the best thing to happen since milk chocolate, don't you dare deny it
> 
> \- The next one is probably going to be very angsty as well, but I promise fluff interludes!
> 
> \- I hope you liked this, because it tore my heart out writing it (but it was also a lot of fun)


End file.
